The Climb, Rue de la Côte-du-Jalet, Pontoise (Chemin montant, rue de la Côte-du-Jalet, Pontoise)
Camille Jacob Pissarro
European Art
On View: European Art Galleries, 5th floor
In this painting, Camille Pissarro departs from the legible perspectives of traditional landscapes. Using an array of techniques, from touches of paint to broad palette-knife applications, he incorporates multiple viewpoints: looking up the path, down through the trees, and across at the buildings.
This complex treatment of space and form, the solidity and structure of his paint surfaces, and the way he unified his compositions through color and tone reveal his interest in capturing his own perceptual experience unfolding over time. Some contemporaneous viewers found such paintings unintelligible, or too difficult to apprehend superficially, as Pissarro acknowledged in an 1883 letter to his son: “It is only at length that I can hope to please, and then only if there is in those who regard me a grain of indulgence; but for the passerby, the coup d’oeil [a brief glance] is too hasty, he sees only the surface.”
In the mid-1870s Pissarro often painted in Pontoise alongside Paul Cézanne, who said of the older artist, “We learned everything we do from Pissarro.”
This complex treatment of space and form, the solidity and structure of his paint surfaces, and the way he unified his compositions through color and tone reveal his interest in capturing his own perceptual experience unfolding over time. Some contemporaneous viewers found such paintings unintelligible, or too difficult to apprehend superficially, as Pissarro acknowledged in an 1883 letter to his son: “It is only at length that I can hope to please, and then only if there is in those who regard me a grain of indulgence; but for the passerby, the coup d’oeil [a brief glance] is too hasty, he sees only the surface.”
In the mid-1870s Pissarro often painted in Pontoise alongside Paul Cézanne, who said of the older artist, “We learned everything we do from Pissarro.”
MEDIUM
Oil on canvas
DATES
1875
DIMENSIONS
21 1/4 x 25 7/8 in. (54 x 65.7 cm)
frame: 29 3/4 x 33 7/8 x 3 3/8 in. (75.6 x 86 x 8.6 cm) (show scale)
SIGNATURE
Signed and dated lower right: "C. Pissarro./1875"
COLLECTIONS
European Art
MUSEUM LOCATION
This item is on view in European Art Galleries, 5th floor
EXHIBITIONS
ACCESSION NUMBER
22.60
CREDIT LINE
Purchased with funds given by Dikran G. Kelekian
RIGHTS STATEMENT
No known copyright restrictions
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CAPTION
Camille Jacob Pissarro (French, 1830-1903). The Climb, Rue de la Côte-du-Jalet, Pontoise (Chemin montant, rue de la Côte-du-Jalet, Pontoise), 1875. Oil on canvas, 21 1/4 x 25 7/8 in. (54 x 65.7 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Purchased with funds given by Dikran G. Kelekian, 22.60 (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 22.60_PS11.jpg)
IMAGE
overall, 22.60_PS11.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph, 2022
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